Carol Of The Bells
by Alex Sambora
Summary: At Christmas, Cranky can't stand Bell Carol and he explains a tragic memory.Will he be able to stand the Carol Of The Bells once more or will he be unable to let go of the fact that it was the last song his horrifically-dead mother ever sang?
1. Tragedy

DTOTF: Hi! Sorry I'm updating this so late because this is a Christmas fic even though Christmas was, like, last month. Anyhow, I only own the way they look as humans in my fic and Cranky's siblings. Enjoy. Caoi!

**Summary:** It's Christmas time on Kongo Bongo and everyone in Cranky's portion is looking forward to hearing some carols only Cranky doesn't want to play a certain one--Carol Of The Bells. Upon having to explain to several people, reveals a specific part of his past that he never wanted to revisit again--the Christmas of the year his mother died. Will he be able to let go of the fact that the Carol Of The Bells was the last song his mother ever sang? Or will he be unable to let go of the horrific memory of the fact that he was only five years old when she died?

"Oh! Christmas time! My favorite time of the year!"

"Whaddaya mean, Wrinkly?"

It was a few days before Christmas and everyone was talking about their plans. Dixie and Diddy, like the other couples, were going spend Christmas together. Cranky, being the seductive bastard at Wrinkly that we all know he is in my fanfics, thought it'd be an 'impressive' idea to just light up some candles and play some carols--but _not_ the _Ukrainian Bell Carol_.

"I still don't understand why you said you weren't going to play _Ukrainian Bell Carol_?" Diddy said.

Just the name of it made Wrinkly's ears perk up.

"The _Ukrainian Bell Carol_?!" she said, her voice higher than usual with excitement.

"That's why," Cranky told Diddy. "You may want to cover your ears."

"Why?"

_Hark how the bells, sweet silver bells, all seem say, "Throw cares away." Christmas is here, bringing good cheer to young and old meek and the bold. "Ding dong ding dong." That is their song with joyful ring. One seems to hear words of good cheer from everywhere filling the air. Oh, how they pound raising the sound o'er hill and dale telling their tale. Gaily they ring while people sing songs of good cheer. Christmas is here._

"That's why," Cranky repeated, clamping a hand over Wrinkly's mouth to stop that 'merry merry merry merry Christmas' lyric to pop out.

"Ah," Diddy said, wondering as to how high Wrinkly's voice could actually go and if she was even able to breathe throughout the song. "I understand."

"If I let go, do you promise to not sing that song until December twenty-sixth?" Wrinkly nodded and Cranky let go.

"I can't help it, Cranky!" she said. "It's a beautiful and majestic melody! How can you not like it?"

"There's just one lyric in there that I can't stand!"

"What lyric is that?" Diddy asked. Cranky looked at Wrinkly as though trying to say, 'Sing the lyric'.

"Sorry, Cra," Wrinkly said. "I can't sing the _Ukrainian Bell Carol_ again until the twenty-sixth. _Don't you even remember?_" she added skeptically. Cranky grumbled under his breath as though he were in fact stupid enough to not remember a promise he had someone make.

He opened his mouth to sing the lyric he hated in his usual Dr. Teeth-styled tone but Wrinkly placed a hand over his mouth, an evil look in her eye telling him to sing it in the same beautiful and majestical harmony/melody. Grumbling underneath his breath again, he then did it correctly:

_Ding dong ding dong_

"You're kidding me right?" Diddy snickered after atleast three minutes of silence and Cranky grumbling swear words under his breath. "The sound of bells? _That's_ what lyric you hate? But the sound bells make are just as beautiful and majestic as the _Ukrainian Bell Carol_!"

"What, are you turnin' sissy on me?" Cranky asked skeptically, glowering at him anime-styled.

"No. But _why_ do you hate this song?" Cranky sighed again.

"Well, it started when I was five..."

**Flashback**

Hark how the bells, sweet silver bells, all seem say, "Throw cares away." Christmas is here, bringing good cheer to young and old meek and the bold. "Ding dong ding dong." That is their song with joyful ring. One seems to hear words of good cheer from everywhere filling the air. Oh, how they pound raising the sound o'er hill and dale telling their tale. Gaily they ring while people sing songs of good cheer. Christmas is here.

_"Mother? What is that song?"_

_"That is the _Ukrainian Bell Carol_, Sr." The young boy with ink-black hair smiled._

_"_Ukrainian Bell Carol_..." He looked up at her. "It's beautiful."_

_Then, there was a loud explosion. The boy and his three siblings were blown back, and so was their mother. When the kids woke up, they saw that their mother was on the ground._

_Not moving._

_Not breathing._

**End flashback**

"Since then, I have never been able to stand that song without thinking of my mother!" Cranky yelled, wiping away the tears in his eyes with the sleeve of his shirt. "But the one thing I hate even more about that song is the sound of bells at the end! That gets me the most upset!"

"Why?" Dixie asked. Cranky sighed.

"You all don't know this," he said. "But I have three siblings. The younger two are twins, born about ten minutes apart. The twins are Hikari and Hikaru, in that age order from oldest twin to youngest. My sister Bell is inbetween me and Hikari. I am the oldest out of the four of us. When the explosion that killed our mother occured, when my sister was three, Bell wound up losing the will to speak. The reason we called her Bell was because her voice was much like the ringing of bells, especially when she was mad at me." Cranky smiled a little, remembering. "Bell was just her nickname. Her real name is Mary Isabell Kong, just like mine is actually Donkey Kong Sr."

"It is?" Diddy and Dixie said in disbelief.

"Yes. Why else would me and Wrinkly yell out, 'Donkey Hanue Romani Asvyen Kong Jr.' instead of just 'Donkey Kong' when DK had done something incredibley stupid? Anyhow, we're getting off task."

"No, no. We got the point," Dixie lied.


	2. The Day Keeps Getting Weirder And Weider

"Brother," a hoarse voice said from behind Cranky. He turned around and his hazel, almond-shaped eyes widened.

"B-Bell!" he gasped, shocked. "Y-you can speak again! But the doctors said that it wasn't possible! Mary Isabell... My sister..." He threw his arms around her, giving her a tight squeeze.

"Brother," Bell said, her voice clearer and more bell-sounding.

Her brother let go but kept his hands on her shoulders, holding her out at half his arms' length. It'd been years since they'd seen each other and it was curiosity as to how she could be speaking again.

"I guess everyone in our family shows doctors what we're made of," Cranky said. "They said that all of your vocal cords erupted but I guess you showed them."

"In the years that have passed since we'd seen each other," Bell said, her voice getting more and more back to the original sound, "I have been trying to redeem my voice."

"It sounds alot better. Now we don't have to use sign language." He made a horrible attempt to say something in sign language.

"I remember you used to be very bad at it." Cranky's face turned red as Wrinkly, Dixie, Diddy, DK, and Swanky guffawed at this.

"Yeah, it looked like I couldn't move my fingers very good," he said. Then he noticed the looks on Dixie, Diddy, DK, and Swanky's faces. "Oh! Um...You guys, this is my sister Bell."

"_You_ have a _sister_?" Swanky said, a smile twitching at his mouth.

"Yeah," Cranky said. "Haven't you noticed that my fraternal instincts are higher than usual standards?"

"It may not seem like it but he _does_ have a sister," Wrinkly said.

"Wri, when did _you_ meet her?" Diddy asked.

"You're forgetting--Cranky's my _husband_. I met her at our wedding."

"Ah."

"Wait wait wait!" DK haulted. "How long has it been since you've seen each other exactly?"

"I 'unno," Cranky shrugged. He and Bell looked at each other. "What, thirty years?"

Silence while DK gaps.

"_I'm_ thirty-_one_ years old!" the Irukaze said.

"Your point?" Cranky, Wrinkly, and Bell said in unison.

"Then that should mean that I've _met_ her before!"

"You have," Cranky said. "You just can't remember because you were still an infant, bozo."

"This is your son?" Bell said, pointing out the obvious.

"Haven't we already established that?!" DK shouted.

"He looks more like you than I'd've thought he would, Nii-san."

"Well," Cranky said, sucking on his teeth. "Atleast that's a way to tell I really am the biological father."

"The same black hair and the same almond-shaped eyes... Yep."

"This is... well, this is odd," a familiar voice said.

"PATTY!!!" Cranky shouted, surprised at seeing his cousin.

Smoke looked like it was coming out Patrick's ears.

"Do _not_ call me that!!!" he screamed. "I _hate_ that name!"

"Why do you think I call you that?" Cranky sneered.

"GRAH!!!!!!!"

Pat tackled Cranky and the two got into a fight.

"...This day just keeps getting weirder and weirder," DK said.

Everyone but Pat and Cranky (they were still fighting) agreed.


End file.
